


The Turkey and the Goose

by slashy (slashmyheartandhopetoporn)



Category: Star Trek: Alternate Original Series (Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-01
Updated: 2015-08-01
Packaged: 2018-04-12 09:11:40
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,268
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4473596
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/slashmyheartandhopetoporn/pseuds/slashy
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>22. two miserable people meeting at a wedding au</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Turkey and the Goose

Leonard didn’t like weddings. Not since his own marriage had fallen apart a year ago. Obnoxious, ostentatious affairs, every one of them. And Jesus, the money they’d blown on their damn reception. The whole thing made him sick, and just looking at the invitation he’d gotten from Spock and Nyota had made him queasy. But he’d been friends with Nyota since before everything had gone south with Jocelyn, and it wasn’t her fault he had such a sour view of the whole marital institution, so here Leonard was, parked at a table with a glass of good ol’ Wild Turkey while the newlyweds made googly eyes at each other (a feat for Spock given his generally lackluster personality–not that Leonard was judging) and Jim, Leonard’s only other friend in the whole joint, made a fool of himself on the dance floor. 

The table he had yet to part ways from--except to refill his glass--had been previously filled with some of the closest friends that Spock and Nyota had: Leonard, Gaila, and Scotty for Nyota; a handful of other scientists for Spock whose names Leonard wasn’t totally surprised to admit he couldn’t remember. Jim, as Spock’s best man, had been seated at the main table with the bridal party. 

All but one of Spock’s friends, a kid who didn’t look like he could be a day over twenty, had either left the table to mingle or joined Jim on the dance floor. The kid, however, looked about as miserable as Leonard. Maybe it was because Leonard was on his third glass that had him feeling sympathetic, maybe it was the delicate lines of the kids hands as his fingers drew patterns in the condensation on his glass of diet coke. Whatever it was, Leonard found himself watching the other man across the table and opening his mouth to speak.

“Not a wedding person either?” he asked.

The kid startled, then offered a bashful smile. “No, I suppose not, I’m afraid.” 

His voice was heavily accented–Russian. He’d been so quiet Leonard hadn’t picked up on it before. “You’re a long way from home,” he said, surprised.

The kid shrugged. “Not so much anymore. Home is San Francisco as it is for the rest of you.”

Leonard’s brow furrowed. “You’re not telling me you’re a student, are you?”

The look on the younger man’s face switched swiftly from bashful to unimpressed. “Shocking, I know,” he said flatly, and it occurred to Leonard why the guy might not be so big on social gatherings with lots of strangers.

“Sorry,” Leonard offered gruffly. “Name’s Leonard, by the way.”

The kid’s face softened. “Pavel,” he replied.

“It’s nice to meet you, Pavel.”

They fell to silence, Pavel’s fingers making lines on his glass again. Leonard finished his bourbon and stood to get another. 

“I’m not trying to be presumptuous,” Pavel said as Leonard turned from the table. “But would you mind terribly getting me a vodka cranberry?”

Leonard sighed. “I suppose I don’t see why not.”

“And a shot of vodka, straight, if you would,” Pavel hurriedly added. Leonard shot him a look and caught the innocent smile playing on Pavel’s lips.

“Pushy, aren’t you?” he asked.

“Me? Never,” Pavel exclaimed. “But I’ll take Russian Standard if they’ve got it.”

“Of course you would,” muttered Leonard as he left the table and headed for the bar.

He returned with three glasses precariously in hand and a renewed gratitude towards Spock and Nyota for having an open bar. Leonard sat slowly in the empty seat beside Pavel and deposited his drinks between them. “No Russian Standard, so I got you Grey Goose.”

Pavel shrugged, an elegant motion. “It’ll do.” Then he threw back the shot and licked his lips.

Leonard grimaced. He hated vodka.

Pavel caught his grimace and smirked, then extended his vodka cranberry in Leonard’s direction. Leonard caught the hint and raised his Wild Turkey.

“ _Za zda-ró-vye_!” said Pavel, then he clinked his glass against Leonard’s.

“So how do you know Spock?” Leonard asked after a healthy sip.

“He was a TA for one of my math courses my first semester here,” explained Pavel. “I was…struggling. My age made it difficult.”

“How old were you?”

Pavel sighed, and that unimpressed expression crept over his features as if in anticipation of a poor response from Leonard. “Fourteen.”

Leonard did not disappoint. “Jesus, kid, how many years ago was that?” Pavel looked ready to bolt, so Leonard hurriedly continued. “I’m just hoping I didn’t provide alcohol to someone below the legal drinking age. I’m a doctor, damnit, I’m not supposed to be supplying poison to the underage. Only the idiots above it.”

Pavel smiled, and Leonard knew he was, if not off the hook, then at least forgiven. “Then I’m very sorry to break it to you, Doctor. I’m but a mere eighteen years of age.”

“Well that’s just great,” Leonard snapped, but he undercut his faux-irritation by lifting his glass for another toast. Pavel clinked their glasses accordingly. “To irresponsible youths and the old coots who enable their bad choices.”

Paval grinned. “I will certainly drink to that. Anyway, Spock became a bit of a mentor during my undergraduate years, and I believe it’s his letter than got me into graduate school.”

“Graduate school,” Leonard said, sounding truly appalled. “I’m twice your age and I’m barely out of med school.”

Pavel flapped a hand and shook his head, as if waving away an unpleasant smell. “If there is one fact I have become intimately aware of, it is that age is almost always a meaningless number.”

Leonard looked at Jim and Scotty on the dance floor—Jim a man in his late twenties, Scotty a man in his late thirties, both of them dancing like drunk undergrads at a frat party—and understood Pavel to be correct. He sighed. “And I’ll drink to that.” They clinked their glasses a third time.

“I’m almost empty,” Pavel said. “If only there was some handsome man of legal drinking age who could supply me with alcoholic sustenance.”

Leonard snorted. “Handsome now, am I?”

Pavel smiled sweetly. “Leonard, you were always handsome. I just felt like saying so out loud now.”

“That ain’t suspicious at all,” he replied, but he stood to get fresh drinks all the same. When he returned he could swear Pavel had shifted his chair closer to Leonard’s, but he elected not to comment. “What are we toasting to now?” he asked, leaning towards Pavel. He was warm with liquor, more touched by it than Pavel, given his head start, and he was becoming rather preoccupied with the line of Pavel’s nose.

“Sobriety,” Pavel said with a wink, and Leonard had to laugh. He liked this kid. “You are friends with Uhura?” Pavel asked after the toast.

Leonard nodded. “Since before I met Jim,” he said, but then considered it might be strange to define his friendship with one person by the friendship he shared with another. “Before med school even,” he continued. Then, because he couldn’t help throwing in at least a dash of self-pity, he tacked on bitterly, “Before Jocelyn.”

“Do I dare ask?” Pavel asked, voice gentler than it’d been throughout the conversation.

“Better not,” Leonard answered. “But I have a question for you.”

“Da,” answered Pavel with a single nod and a smile.

“You want to go back to my room with me?”

Pavel grinned, threw back the rest of drink, and slammed the glass on the table. “I would love to.”

Leonard finished his own drink and then stood. “Then what are waiting for?” 

**Author's Note:**

> I'm still working out how I see these characters interacting with one another. This is one option I'm exploring. Forgive me if it seems ooc--it's sometimes a struggle to resist seeing these two the way fandom most often sees them, as much as those versions have their charms, and canon has given us so little to work with /cries
> 
> find me on tumblr: http://slashmyheartandhopetoporn.tumblr.com/


End file.
